Update From the Editor's Desk

What's coming to this space... and why I'm breathing through a straw

My accountability partner, Stace, convinced me to write an update to my subscribers while I am at work on my next meaty post about why it may be harder for trauma survivors to experience "flow." 

So, I'm writing to tell you how swamped I am and to thank you for staying subscribed. I launched this Stack with weekly posts on Sundays and committed for six months, and I invite you to visit past posts to catch up. The post that precedes this one was a happy accident, meant for my personal Substack, published using my phone, and I didn't want to delete it and have email recipients land in Nowheresville from the newsletter. Turns out, a little vulnerability was appreciated by readers, and subscribership jumped. I am a passionate lover and a loyal friend, and one day I wondered what would happen if I beamed love toward myself. I should listen to the audio once a week to clear my brain of negative self-talk. I think that post resonated with lots of people because self-love is hard, and our self-love muscle needs exercise. 

So: right now I have seven book editing clients. I'm seeing a surge in fiction authorship. About 1 in every 5 books I edit is fiction. After working as a fiction editor at Level4Press based in LA for more than a year, I wanted to return to nonfiction, so I could grow from the content I read, learning everything from orthopedics to forensic police work. But I grow from editing fiction, too, and get to apply the principles I teach in creative writing classes, about scene setting, character development, structure, and symbolism. I also take on a couple poetry clients every year. 

Currently, I'm editing a fiction written by a cis white male with an MC who is a black woman from the South in the mid-1900s; I'm editing a fiction about a nightclub shooting; I'm editing a romance that takes place in a science lab, with some paranormal elements; I'm editing a guidebook to meal planning; I'm editing a sports medicine book; I'm editing a coaching book by a sign language interpreter; I'm editing a memoir in essays; I'm editing a travelogue coauthored by a couple who circled the globe in 1970, which is really interesting because they describe foreign lands before the tourism industry took off... plus book proposals, query letters, and magazine articles. 

As a single mother of two, I need to prioritze my paid work. I'm the sole chef, janitor, handywoman, and principal of my daughters' home-based education. Plus we house two cats and a colony of stick bugs (which I published an essay about here.) Co-writing sessions have helped keep my writing life productive. There are many free groups to join. My absolute favorite are Kimberly McElhattan’s co-writing sessions on Tuesdays and Thursdays.

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For now, all of my content is free. I plan to paywall the publication of my editing contracts. It's taken me years to evolve my agreements for the best results for both authors and publishing coaches, so I'm eager to share them but must recoup some of my investment in the work. 

I think publishing my redacted contracts will help writers shape their expectations of independent editors whom they might work with, and I know freelance editors always appreciate seeing sample contracts.

Also forthcoming will be a series of embodied practices for removing blocks and accessing our innate well of creativity (without retraumatizing ourselves).

If you haven't already, please contribute to the database of resources for trauma writers by sharing your recommendations here in this survey. When I’ve amassed a robust list, I will share this awesome resource with subscribers.

And, if you would consider a paid subscription, it will help me serve this community with more informative posts and publishing resources, because I'll be able to move Substack higher on my always brimming to-do list. 

For those curious about my educational and professional background, I entered NYU as an acting major in the Strasberg Studio at Tisch, then moved to the College of Arts and Sciences to earn a BA in Psychology with Specialization in Neuroscience. My assistantship was in the PET scanning lab at Mount Sinai Hospital. My minors were English and Creative Writing. I hold an MA in Writing from DePaul University; a Certificate in Manuscript Editing from University of Chicago Publishing Program; and experience at major publishers in New York, including McGraw-Hill, Springer, and Condé Nast, plus a decade of freelance editing after I left corporate when I had children. I've been leading creative writing workshops for a decade, and teaching at institutions in Westchester and Sullivan Counties in New York. I've lived in Manhattan, New Rochelle, and Bethel, NY, where I came to escape the pandemic hysteria downstate in 2020 and never left because it's so pleasant here in the mountains. Neighbors drop off maple syrup and jam, and we hunker down together in wintertime. Over our 4+ years here, my daughters have become sure-footed in the forest and on the snow, and competent with tools, fire tending, cooking, and multimedia art. (They also speak several foreign languages and play various musical instruments, but I will reserve more proud mom toots for personal pages.)

All this is to say, I'm often craving rest, but I devote loving attention to editing. I am very thorough in my work, as my clients will attest. I take a little longer than hires from Fiverr or Reedsy and I charge more, but my background and experience translate to results that are worth the investment. I used to edit 300 pages a day by hand using proofreader's marks at Condé Nast, and my titles are still in circulation, including The History of Furniture, The Encyclopedia of Menswear, Guide to Fashion Sewing, Designing for Designers, and many architecture and interior design books. So are some of the psych and nursing books I edited for Springer. And the content I developed for science textbooks at McGraw-Hill has been carried forward into later editions. My private clients have been published by Simon & Schuster, Penguin, and Hachette, as well as university publishers and noteworthy small presses. My clients who are essayists and journalists publish in HuffPo, WaPo, Hippocampus, Chicago Tribune, Newsweek, Psychology Today, and many more.

My own essays have appeared in Discover Magazine, Business Insider, Humans and Nature, Hippocampus, Yellow Arrow Journal, Saltfront, and GoNomad. I recently pitched The Cut. Wish me luck.

Many of my authors over the last 5 years have chosen to self-publish. For a long time, I would always urge authors to go for the gold and pursue agency representation and traditional publishing. If not, then small press publishing. I'm softening on this stance. Authors want creative control, a quicker route to holding a copy of their book, and they have the web-based tools to market their books and the freedom to make their own travel schedules for tours. It's rare that a self-published book will appear on brick-and-mortar shelves, but with small print runs aimed at niche markets, success is getting new and satisfying definitions. I'm proud to be a part of every project I work on, and clients gain a lifelong cheerleader when they work with me. My email is originalprint@gmail.com and my Calendly link to book a free intro call is here. What makes me a trauma-sensitive editor? See this post.

This is all to say, I'm the duck who appears calm but is paddling mightily below the surface, with two ducklings trailing behind me whom I must feed and clothe. Please stay tuned for the wonderful resources I will share soon. 

Thank you, 

Michelle